


Perfect

by Fancy Lads Snacks (Filthy_Bunny)



Series: Judesville [4]
Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Post-Canon, Zion, best day ever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-06
Updated: 2015-07-06
Packaged: 2018-04-07 22:01:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4279503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Filthy_Bunny/pseuds/Fancy%20Lads%20Snacks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jude takes Arcade to his favourite place, and has the best day ever watching Arcade have the best day ever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perfect

**Author's Note:**

> This was the first Jude fic I wrote, but chronologically comes later. The series doesn't need to be read in order.

Jude sat on the river bank, occasionally poking at the fire under the coffee pot and watching Arcade’s first attempts at fishing.

The doctor stood in the shallows in his undershirt with his pants legs rolled up but still drenched. His hands were poised just above the water’s surface and he hunched over, watching intently for movement around his feet. Jude knew he’d never catch anything, but what did that matter? He’d never seen Arcade this happy before, so undefended and free, logic abandoned in favour of fun. It was like ten years had dropped off him in just one day.

The path to Zion had been long and hard, just as before, but rough travel was nothing new to either man. They’d reached the canyon that morning after spending the night in the shelter of the mountain pass. As the sun rose Jude had narrated the story of his first visit, pointing out the positions of the ambushing White Legs, the stack of rocks where he’d taken shelter to reload his rifle. Led them past the graves he’d dug for Jed and Stella and the others. Arcade had listened but most of all he’d looked; whenever Jude stopped to turn around, Arcade had been examining something, either staring off at some distant vista or squinting up at the rock paintings or crouched down to poke at whatever was growing or crawling in the dirt. Jude had smiled and hurried him along, grumbled that they were yao guai bait if they didn’t keep moving. Old habits died hard.

At the river, Jude had left Arcade with his latest patch of fascinating weeds and dumped his pack and guns by the water’s edge. This was what he’d missed the most about Zion, even more than the scenery or the friends he had made; the water. He’d pulled off his boots, socks and shirt and walked right in. Where it got deep enough, he’d dived under the surface and swam. He loved this like nothing else. Emerged with a gasp a minute later and found Arcade watching him warily from the bank. Jude had waded back to the shallows, hair dripping in his eyes and soaked pants dragging down on his hips, and heard Arcade’s shout of alarm when he cupped some water in his hands and drank. Again, old habits.

“What—it’s _clean_?” Arcade’s eyebrows had shot the highest they’d been yet.

Jude had just grinned and beckoned him in.

Watching Arcade wade in and take his first sip, hearing his little sound of surprise and delight at how good it tasted, had kept the smile glued to Jude’s face. Then Arcade had looked at him as though Jude was the best damn thing he’d ever seen, and Jude had kissed the breath out of him, standing knee-deep in the river under clear skies in his favourite place on earth.

In a cave nearby they’d gotten out of their wet clothes and into a tangle of blankets, where they’d stayed long after they were sated on each other and their breath had slowed and skin cooled, enjoying the pure lazy indulgence of not having to be anywhere else.

Loud splashing brought Jude back to the moment.

“Ha!” Arcade’s voice rang out. “I almost had one that time.”

“Sure you did,” Jude laughed. “I’ll get the tribals to show you how it’s really done.”

Arcade conceded defeat at last and came to join Jude by the fire, stubbornly declaring that their days of eating from cans were numbered. Jude poured him some coffee and fixed him a plate of Cram hash, and they ate in contented silence.

-

They reached the Sorrows camp at dusk, where Waking Cloud greeted them with a cry of delight. She introduced Jude to her new husband, a tall, peaceful-looking man in Dead Horse garb, and proudly jutted out her round belly to show him how the latest addition to her family was coming along. Jude introduced Arcade, who was a little taken aback but nonetheless touched by Cloud’s warm embrace. She was soon clapping her hands and shouting orders at the other men and women to get food and shelter ready for their guests.

By the fire with the adults, Jude and Arcade were fed as much food as they could bear—including fresh fish, to Arcade’s delight as well as chagrin—and drank until they were rosy-cheeked. Jude recognised Dead Horses and Sorrows alike, and Waking Cloud explained that the two tribes had more or less become one after the White Legs were defeated. Her husband had tried to convince Waking Cloud to join him at the Dead Horse camp, but she had too much business to take care of in her home camp. (She translated this for the man at her side, who gave his wife a look of adoring exasperation that was uncannily like the way Arcade looked at Jude.) Where was Daniel, Jude wondered? His absence was notable. Cloud looked sad, and told him that these days Daniel spent as much time away from the camp as he did in it. He had taken the slaughter of the White Legs hard.

“He wanted a solution without suffering, but we both know that was impossible,” she said. Jude nodded and looked at the fire.

Cloud’s kids and their friends ran around them while they talked, playing with whatever they could get their hands on from Jude’s pack. The little ones were just as smitten with the empty Mentats tin as the toy cars he’d brought for them inside it. They were also fascinated by Arcade and his pale, shiny hair. By the time the children were dragged complaining away from the campfire and off to bed, Arcade’s head was as ruffled as when Jude had been at work on him. Looked almost as happy, too.

After midnight, Cloud led them up steep steps between the rocks and over a rope bridge to a cave where they could stay. She whispered something to Jude that made him bark laughter, something he refused to share with Arcade. He just grinned, and once their hostess was well out of earshot, wrestled Arcade down onto the nest of yao guai furs and proceeded to mess up his hair even more.

Later still, worn out but not ready to let the day be over just yet, they stood outside and shared a cigarette under the stars. Jude had forgotten quite how bright they were up here, away from Vegas’ permanent dusty glow. Every now and then one of them would spot a shooting star, always gone by the time they’d drawn the other’s attention, but they kept trying nonetheless. In between, Jude told Arcade the story of the Father in the Caves. Not the legend; the real story.

His voice grew a little rough when he got to the deaths of Randall’s second family. Arcade just watched him, eyes soft.

“He wanted to end it all after that,” Jude explained. “Couldn’t ever go through with it though. The goddamn atomic bomb hadn’t finished him off, seemed like nothing else could either. Kinda like me, I guess.” He laughed harshly. “I got shot in the fuckin’ _head_ , and it didn’t stop me. I’ve stepped on mines, been burned, stabbed, poisoned, irradiated. I’ve wandered into a nest of deathclaws—”

_"Please don’t remind me,”_ Arcade muttered.

“—and yet here I am, all my limbs still attached, heart still pumping and ready to go.”

“Is invincibility such a bad thing?”

“It can be. If you’re the only one.” Jude squeezed Arcade’s hand. “Randall didn’t want to live without his family. But he had to.”

“And you?”

Jude looked at him in the near-dark. “I couldn’t bear it either.” He didn’t need to say the rest. Arcade surely understood. But it wasn’t just about being understood, was it? It was about having the guts to say it out loud. “I wouldn’t want to live without you.”

Jude thought about what Waking Cloud had told him earlier; that the cave they were using usually served as a bridal suite for tribal couples. Jude had laughed, but it had gotten him thinking. Thinking about a question he’d been toying with since their victory at the Dam but had tried to bury. Maybe this was the time. Surely there would never be a more perfect day than this.

“So don’t,” Arcade whispered, and leaned in to kiss the corner of his mouth.

No, this was perfect enough.


End file.
